Aquaculture Without Borders: Most Significant Change Stories from the Agriculture and Nutrition Extension Project in Bangladesh and Nepal
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
Aquaculture without borders: Most significant change stories from the Agriculture and Nutrition Extension Project in Bangladesh and Nepal 2 AQUACULTURE WITHOUT BORDERS: MOST SIGNIFICANT CONTENTS 3 CHANGE STORIES FROM THE AGRICULTURE AND NUTRITION List of figures 5 EXTENSION PROJECT IN BANGLADESH AND NEPAL Introduction 6 A brief description of the Agriculture and Nutrition Extension Project (ANEP) 6 Monitoring and evaluation of the ANEP aquaculture component 8 Authors Conceptual background 8 Khondker Murshed-e-Jahan,1 Ahmed Nur Orko,1 Varsha Upraity,2 Hazrat Ali,1 Chandra Kant Devkota,2 Vishwa Chandra Pokhrel,2 Increase in productivity and income through adopting improved agricultural technologies 8 Gurung Shailesh2 and Md. Al Masud1 Gender equity at the household and community level 8 Authors Affiliations Improved market access for the resource-poor 8 Monitoring and evaluation tools 10 1 WorldFish Bangladesh 2 CEAPRED Nepal Collecting the most significant change stories 10 Most significant change stories in Bangladesh and Nepal 12 Citation Most significant change stories by domain 13 This publication should be cited as: Jahan KM, Orko AN, Upraity V, Ali H, Devkota CK, Pokhrel VC, Shailesh G and Masud MA. 2015. Stories from Bangladesh 14 Aquaculture Without Borders: Most Significant Change Stories from the Agriculture and Nutrition Extension Project in Bangladesh Eating fish daily 15 and Nepal. Penang, Malaysia: WorldFish. Booklet: 2015-03. Generating income, satisfying family needs 17 Acknowledgments So much more is possible 19 The authors are grateful to the EU-supported Agriculture and Nutrition Extension Project (ANEP) and to the CGIAR Research Market links and improved technology made me successful 21 Program on Aquatic Agricultural Systems for providing funding support to publish this MSC booklet. The authors are also I turned my life around 23 thankful to all stakeholders from Bangladesh and Nepal whose conscientious participation were essential in the realization of this publication and associated research work. The authors would like to extend their gratitude to Kevin Kamp, Charles Crissman, No one believed a woman can earn money from aquaculture 25 Michael Phillips, Benjamin Belton, Paula Kantor, Craig Meisner, Boru Douthwaite, Diane Shohet, Florine Lim and Terry Clayton for I am a respected leader 27 lending their expertise and support in ensuring the quality of this publication. Acknowledgement will also go to Biplob Basak, Syed Mohammad Masum, Mohammad Mahfuzur Rahman, Farha Khan and Charlene Hasib for giving necessary support in Earning a little respect 29 collecting and organizing these stories. The authors are also thankful to Kazi Ali Toufique, Research Director, Bangladesh Institute Gaining some independence 31 of Development Studies for reviewing and authenticating these MSC stories. The sole responsibility of any errors or oversight lies with the authors. My business has grown rapidly 33 Networking increased my client base 35 I would never be where I am today 37 Good news travels fast 39 Gaining respect through knowledge sharing 43 Partnerships need collegial relations 47 Stories from Nepal 50 4 5 A boon to farmers 51 LIST OF FIGURES Confident in my ability 55 A big house is not always a measure of success 59 Figure 1 Barisal Sadar, Hizla and Mehendiganj sub-districts, Barisal district in Bangladesh 3 Now my business is profitable, less risky and easy to manage 63 Figure 2 Nawalparasi and Rupandehi districts, Nepal 3 Aquaculture is good for me 67 Figure 3 Theory of change framework of ANEP aquaculture component 5 Working at home is better than working abroad 71 I gained confidence from seeing what others were doing 75 We are a happier and healthier family 79 I believe in my strengths 83 My life before and after is as different as day and night 87 Using new technology has boosted my customer base 91 Now I have an identity 95 I dream of expanding my business 99 Opening a new window 103 We will be a major fish-producing village 105 The knowledge I gained from my research made me more confident 107 I will do more collaborative research 111 Story synthesis 114 Conclusions 116 References 117 Annex 1: Independent consultant’s evaluation report 118 This component of the ANEP was designed to increase the productive capacities of unused or underused seasonal ponds using 6 7 affordable technologies to resource-poor households. In Bangladesh, fish farmers were identified within one year of the project INTRODUCTION start-up. It proved to be more difficult to implement the project in Nepal, where there were only 86 ponds at the beginning of the project ; the aquaculture component also worked on asset development by motivating farmers to construct ponds in The most significant change stories in this booklet cover many topics – technology, gender, markets, research partnerships and Nepal. Farmers were given a small amount of money as a grant for pond construction. By July 2013, the project beneficiaries had scaling – illustrating the broad range of outcomes from Agriculture and Nutrition Extension Project (ANEP). We focus here on most successfully constructed more than 517 ponds. significant change stories relating to aquaculture. A prominent theme was the power of international visits where participants learned from each other. We chose the title ‘Aquaculture without borders’ to highlight both the broad range of outcomes of the project, and the power of exchange visits. Most significant change stories (MSCs) have become a widely accepted way of monitoring and evaluating complex interventions. The technique involves the generation of stories by a number of stakeholders involved in the intervention who recount in their own words what they see as significant changes brought about by the intervention. It is participatory, as project stakeholders are involved both in deciding the changes to be recorded and in analyzing the data. It is a form of monitoring because it occurs throughout the program cycle and provides information to help people manage the program. It contributes to evaluation because it provides data on impact and outcomes that can be used to help assess the performance of the program as a whole (Dart and Davies 2003). After the initial story generation process, the stories that have the greatest significance are selected by stakeholders and are discussed in-depth. These discussions bring into focus the outcomes and impacts of the intervention that have had the most meaningful effects on the lives of the beneficiaries and other stakeholders. For the ANEP, the stories were collected principally by extension staff and later examined by an independent consultant. The extension staff selected the stories they thought were most significant and gave reasons for why they chose particular stories. A brief description of the Agriculture and Nutrition Extension Project (ANEP) Figure 1. Barisal Sadar, Hizla and Mehendiganj sub-districts, Barisal district in Bangladesh. The EU-supported Agriculture and Nutrition Extension Project (ANEP) began in Bangladesh and Nepal in December 2011 and ended in November 2014. The objectives of the project were to: (1) improve the food security and nutrition of smallholders by facilitating the adoption of productive and environmentally sustainable agricultural technologies that improve beneficiaries’ livelihoods; and (2) create and develop market links to improve food and nutritional security of both rural producers and urban consumers in Bangladesh and Nepal. International Development Enterprises (IDE) led the overall management and vegetable subsector activities; the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), and WorldFish took the lead on transfer of technologies and activities related to cereal and legume crops and fish. Save the Children Nepal and Save the Children Bangladesh were responsible for: the selection and social mobilization of households; and providing health and nutrition training to food-insecure rural and urban households and national partners, including the Community Development Center (CODEC), the Center for Environmental and Agricultural Policy Research, Extension and Development (CEAPRED), and the Backwardness Eradication Society (BES); and implementing the project in the activity areas in collaboration with international partners. WorldFish Bangladesh provided technical support to its implementing partners, the Community Development Centre in Bangladesh, and the Center for Environmental and Agricultural Policy Research Extension and Development Department in Nepal for the dissemination of aquaculture technologies to smallholder fish-farming households. The ANEP aquaculture component worked in the Barisal Sadar, Hizla and Mehendiganj upazilas (sub-districts) of Barisal district in Bangladesh (Figure 1) and Nawalparasi and Rupandehi districts in Nepal (Figure 2). The project disseminated integrated aquaculture–agriculture-based technologies for carp polyculture with-and-without nutrient-dense, small, indigenous fish species in ponds. A total of 1909 Figure 2. Nawalparasi and Rupandehi districts, Nepal. resource-poor households in Bangladesh and 603 households in Nepal were the direct target beneficiaries of the project. 8 Improvements of food security and nutrition of the poorest and most vulnerable 9 MONITORING AND EVALUATION OF THE ANEP AQUACULTURE COMPONENT households in Bangladesh and Nepal Intermediate outcomes Conceptual background as lead farmers to run the training sessions. Groups were linked